Breckenridge x2

Lucky Me!  I got to go to Breckenridge TWICE this winter already!  It's such a beautiful little town full of window shopping, eating, gondola riding, and people watching.  What a treat it has been this month to visit twice.  Once with my BEST California friend (we met at BSF while we lived there for two years) and the second time with my sweet family.  Definitely thankful for these getaways!

Adrienne, my dear friend, flew out so we could have a moms weekend away!  It was something we had been talking about for a long time since we don't live near each other anymore.  We finally committed and booked the trip and boy was it all worth it!  We got to hang out by the fire, watch movies, take naps, walk the town, dine out without kids!  It was heavenly :)  I enjoyed this time so much with Adrienne and we are hoping to make this a tradition each year.....I'm sure Thomas and Nathan wouldn't mind :)

Thomas surprised me and the girls with a couple nights away the very next week and back to Breck I went.  It was a different trip to say the least, but another memorable and fun one for sure!  The girls loved all the snow!  I think their favorite parts were the gondola ride and throwing snowballs into the creek.  The little things...  We found this great toy store that had an entire play area in the back which the girls loved.  We also got to ride on the carriage while the (stinky) horses took us for a ride.  The highlight for me was watching the girls paint their own ceramic plate while seeing the snow fall outside.  It was so perfect!  We were so thankful for this relaxing family getaway filled with snowballs, movies and a great breakfast at the Blue Moose!

As thanksgiving has come and gone, I'd be silly to not say I"M THANKFUL!  For the God given, sweet friendship that Adrienne and I share and for my loving family who will always love me no matter what.  I'm forever grateful for these important people in my life and time that I've been blessed with to spend in a peaceful place.

A Visit from Grandma and Grandpa Fish

Last week was special.  We got a visit from Grandma Anne and Grandpa Fish!  They came for loads of family fun and how great it is for them that they now only have to visit one location to see ALL OF THEIR KIDS!  I'm a sucker for getting together with family.  I absolutely love it and never get enough.  I love any excuse for a family get together!  And what's a better excuse than a birthday party!?!?  Katin turned FOUR, yes people, she's FOUR!  Only one year away from being able to chew gum (I said that once and she remembers forever).  So of course next year all she wants for her birthday is pink gum.  This year...another story.  She wanted a cow cake that Grandma sent a picture of in the mail.  She was set on making that cow cake.  How hard could it be, really?  Um...hard!  But thanks to Aunt Becky and Grandma Anne we pulled it off.  So the week was complete with a four year old party with a house full of family, a CU football game, a Stampede Parade on Pearl Street, a visit to Anderson Farms, a special birthday outing to Xtreme Altitude, a dinner out to the Rio, and maybe a little too much cow cake, cuz the last day our visitors were here Katin and I were SICK SICK SICK!  All is OK now, but of course we would have loved to have spent their last day WITH them.  We loved every moment of their visit though and we were so happy they got to sleep over at our house!  The girls loved waking up and seeing them in the morning right away...in their jammies!  One day they even got to go in and jump on the bed and wake them up!  Whoah!  So fun!  So thanks mom and Doug for a special trip to Colorado.  One we will always remember (which do we NOT remember???!!!)  Enjoy life back on the beach...we will be there soon!!!

Only missing Harry

 Birthday morning waffles...complete with candles!

Me and my birthday girl :) 

The cow cake! 

Getting the party started! 

The cousins...so sweet! 

Daddy and Aubs- she wanted to take that huge pumpkin home.  After I asked her and Katin where it would fit, they said...."we could put it on our roof" 

Grandma and her babies 

Oh man she loved this barrel ride!

And awesome seats for the game (C'mon Buffs!) that David got us.

Avery's First Birthday

This weekend we celebrated Avery's First Birthday at the new Kinney House.  It was such a great party, filled with balloons, happy kids and great conversations.  Our special birthday niece even had a few long distance travelers in town- Grandma and Grandpa Kinney and Grandma and Grandpa Anthony.  We love you Avery!  And I'm totally going to eat my next birthday cake just like you did!  #facefirst

Whoa!

My mom says I should update my blog so I can always remember these precious moments later!  And I know she wants to see the girls...here ya go mom!

It's been a whirlwind of a summer and I'm going to keep this one short and sweet.  We're moving!  And these three words describe how I'm feeling about it:

Ecstatic!

Blessed!

Thankful!

and one hashtag: #PinterestIsNowOverwhelming

More on the house later, but for now here is what we've been up to...

Loving having family close by...WE LOVE UNCLE HARRY!  Avery is also very fun to play wrestle with.

Staying cool in Grandma and Papa Milburn's backyard

 Going for motorcycle rides around the block with dad...

 Climbing trees along trails...

And even road tripping it out to California...

God is good. 

Happy Birthday America!

This year the girls stayed up all the way until the firework show was over!  Big deal around here!!  And we were reminded how much our girls need sleep when they "woke up" the next morning.  Let's just say they were....tired....

Here's just a few pics of the fourth of July celebration they have at a local lake.  Band, pony rides, beer, hot dogs, face paint.  The girls loved it!  And of course I had to dress them alike :)

Mama's Takin Us to the Zoo Tomorrow

Well I actually took them a few days ago, but the song is so fun to sing.  We had a great time gazing at all the animals with Aunt Becky and Cousin Avery and Shaina and her son Josh.  We all had a great time and thanks to Shaina it was a free outing!  Which was really nice because we didn't feel like we needed to push the kids to spend AAAALLLL day there to see every single winged, furry, scaly, waddling creature in the park.  When we got too hot, we left.  It was perfect.  If you ask Aubrey what her favorite animal was she'd now say the Giraffes.  Before she said the Turkeys, but we never even saw Turkeys so....  Giraffes it is.  She loves telling me that there were five of them and that they were really big ones.  Katin would tell you her favorite animal was the carousel.  So I guess that means her favorite was the Stork.  The animal she got to ride on the carousel.  So cute.  She also talks about the penguins a lot and tries to walk like them asking me how to waddle.  She tries to keep her knees locked and waddle and it's the funniest thing I've seen in a while.  My favorite...the grizzle bears!  They were putting on a show like they were getting paid to live at a zoo!  It was awesome.  But the barrier between them and us suddenly got really dinky, so we moved on.  Wouldn't want to meet one of those....EVER....  The Denver Zoo is quite wonderful really.  It's very well shaded and has a good layout.  I don't know if I would say it's nicer or more grandiose than the San Diego Zoo (shout out to Jordan and Chad), but nevertheless it's really a fun outing with kids!